James Traub finds U.S. civic education failing as many students learn little

In a New York Times review, Mark Lilla reports on James Traub’s book, The Cradle of Citizenship, in which Traub—after visiting publicly funded schools across the United States in the 2023–2024 academic year—concludes that the central crisis in civic education is not which historical narratives are taught but that many students are learning almost nothing.

He also found that most teachers, faced with political pressures and administrative directives, are trying their best. Traub documents partisan battles in states such as Texas and Florida that create an “ideological weather pattern for the schools,” yet he saw few examples of overt partisanship in classrooms apart from a Minnesota science teacher with a Black Lives Matter poster and a Gay Pride banner.

He reports that some schools have become cautious about certain subjects; in Florida, he says, parents at one Miami school received a notice that first graders would need a signed permission slip to “participate and listen to a book written by an African American.” The book highlights structural causes Traub attributes to the wider educational establishment: many districts hire graduates with education degrees rather than subject degrees, producing a stronger emphasis on teaching methods—expressed in jargon like “inquiry-based learning”—and an aversion to memorization of vocabulary, chronology and narrative.

Key Topics

Culture, James Traub, Civic Education, Classical Charter Schools, Florida